No Janet Yellen, The Economy Is Not "Getting Better"

On Tuesday, new Federal Reserve Chairman Janet Yellen went before Congress and confidently declared that "the economic recovery gained greater traction in the second half of last year" and that "substantial progress has been made in restoring the economy to health". This resulted in glowing headlines throughout the mainstream media such as this one from USA Today: "Yellen: Economy is improving at moderate pace". Sadly, tens of millions of Americans are going to believe what the mainstream media is telling them. But it isn't the truth. As you will see below, there are all sorts of signs that the economy is taking a turn for the worse. And when the next great economic crisis does strike, most Americans will be completely and totally unprepared because they trusted our "leaders" when they told us that everything would be just fine.

It is amazing how deceived people can be. Just consider the case of 56-year-old Brian Perry. He is a former law clerk that has applied for nearly 1,500 jobs since 2008 without any success. But he says that he is "optimistic" that he will get another job soon because he believes that the economy is recovering...

By his own count, Brian Perry has applied for nearly 1,500 jobs since being let go as a law clerk in 2008. The 56-year old Perry lives in Rhode Island, where the 9.1 percent unemployment rate is 2.5 percentage points above the national average.

Perry remains optimistic that a job is forthcoming. He thinks a more robust economy would create better opportunities for the long-term unemployed like him.

Let us certainly hope that Perry does find a new job soon. But if he does, it won't be because we are experiencing an "economic recovery". Just consider the following facts...

-In January, we were told that the U.S. economy "created" 113,000 new jobs. But that figure was arrived at only after adding a massive seasonal adjustment. In reality, the U.S. economy actually lost 2.87 million jobs in January. During the past decade, the only time the U.S. economy has lost more jobs in January was during 2009. At that time, the U.S. economy was suffering through the peak of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.

-Prominent retailers are closing hundreds of stores all over the United States. Things have gotten so bad that some are calling this a "retail apocalypse"...

JC Penney, which lost $586 million in three months in 2013, is planning to close 33 stores in 19 states and lay off 2,000 people. JC Penney’s stock has lost 84 percent of its value since February 2012.

Sears has decided to shut down its flagship store in Downtown Chicago, and it has closed 300 stores in the United States since 2010. Stock analyst Brian Sozzi noted that Sear’s inventory levels have fallen by 23.7 percent since 2006. He also noted that Sears had $4.4 billion in cash and equivalents in 2005 but $609 million in cash and equivalents in 2012. Sozzi, who calls himself a guerrilla analyst, has a blog full of disturbing pictures of empty Sears stores.

Macy’s, one of the few retail success stories, is planning to close five stores and eliminate 2,500 jobs.

Radio Shack is preparing to close 500 stores, according to The Wall Street Journal.

-In January, real disposable income in the U.S. experienced the largest year over year decline that we have seen since 1974.

-As I wrote about the other day, the number of "planned job cuts" in January was 12 percent higher than 12 months earlier, and it was actually 47 percent higher than in December.

-Only 35 percent of all Americans say that they are better off financially than they were a year ago.

-What is happening to the U.S. stock market right now very closely resembles what happened to the U.S. stock market just before the horrific stock market crash of 1929. Just check out the chart in this article.

Meanwhile, things continue to unravel all around the rest of the globe as well.

In previous articles, I have detailed how the reckless money printing by the Federal Reserve has inflated massive financial bubbles in emerging markets all over the planet. Now that the Fed is "tapering", those bubbles are starting to burst and we are witnessing a tremendous amount of economic chaos. Here are three more examples...

Ghanaian Economist Dr. Theo Richardson says Ghana’s economy will crash by June this year if the Bank of Ghana continues with its kneejerk measures to rescue the cedi.

“The government is facing liquidity problems and if we don’t get the appropriate remedies to address the issues at hand the situation may worsen and by June the economy may crash,” Dr. Richardson said.

With only $24.5 billion left in FX reserves after valiantly defending major capital outflows since the Fed's Taper announcement, the Kazakhstan central bank has devalued the currency (Tenge) by 19% - its largest adjustment since 2009. At 185 KZT to the USD, this is the weakest the currency has ever been as the central bank cites weakness in the Russian Ruble and "speculation" against its currency as drivers of the outflows (which will be "exhausted" by this devaluation according to the bank). The new level will improve the country's competitiveness (they are potassium heavy) but one wonders whether, unless Yellen folds whether it will help the outflows at all.

In the wake of a global stock market sell-off driven by worries over slower growth in emerging markets, the head of India's central bank, Raghuram Rajan, criticized the U.S. Federal Reserve as it pressed on with plans to dial back its monthly bond purchases: "International monetary co-operation has broken down," said Rajan, who added that "the U.S. should worry about the effects of its polices on the rest of the world."

We have reached a "turning point" for the global financial system. Things are beginning to fall apart both in the United States and all around the world.

But at least the dogs at the White House are eating well. Just consider the following photo that was recently tweeted by Michelle Obama...

Is one more pretty face?! Well, not so much. That was a huge opening benchmark for Janet to set herself. Wait to you see her when it is fully realized that she is just a tootless old hag with nothing to offer other than lots of happy talk. I like the way it was depicted in The Blues Brothers; "You're gonna look pretty funny trying to eat corn on the cob WITH NO FUCKING TEETH!"

Exactly, they may be braindead followers of the exalted boobtube but they aren't getting fooled by the talking heads. The only ones I've talked to who think things are getting better are top 10%ers and for them it IS getting better.

This is just the beauty of capitalism and free market. Nothing wrong with corporations being profit driven and caring for the shareholders.

Also, the governments of those Emerging Market countries should stop blaming USA, its their own fault for not balancing the budget and relying on USD so much! how about make a new global currency instead of whining at the Fed?

Yeah, lets have a new global currency monopoly created by the same sociopaths that created the last WRC. The private IMF can then charge the UN with raising a global army to enforce the new legal tender laws. Yeah, that's the ticket!

Should be no problems with a dictatorship of elites, so long as they wear suits and seem like good guys when they're interviewed by Matt Lauer on Good Morning America taking hardball questions about their children and pets.

They've flooded markets with liquidity so corporations can do stock buybacks and use their record amounts of cash to play in the casino rather than hiring or paying humans to produce something of value.

It is NOT, because it doesn't allow for failure (the banks, AIG, GM, speculators in the housing market, etc.), the government bails them all out with taxpayer money. There are no losers and no downside risk with the government backstop always available.

I know you shouldn't feed trolls but I'll toss you a doggy biscuit. If someone steals my wallet are they richer? why yes! but it's not their money...so if I catch him and beat his ass and then take my wallet back I'm not making him "distribute" his wealth. I'm taking back my own.

QE and bailouts are theft, and we're catching up to the pudgey bastard. Another note, don't associate the Cronyism going on with the values this country was founded upon. Enjoy the biscuit, your money paid for it.

The bailout was not a solution, it has made the problem worse. In 2008 there was a chance of a structured default and then recovery after the pain. Now things are so fucked who knows what is next, but i can promise you it will be worse than if we had let things fail in 2008. We have no choice in this, things will fail and there is no fix so yes im saying we should have let it burn back then.

I think the elites have bit off more than they can chew this time, before there were always new markets to foist the scheme onto, now that this shit is global they have nowhere to go. We wil be lucky to avoid another fucking dark age and in such enviroments their type of parasite doesnt do well. Its to decentraized.

Problem didn't start in 2008, dumbass. A private corporation with a government enforced monopoly of the currency manipulating markets is what brought us into the Collapse Era and is why it wasn't prevented.

So your solution is to let the same sociopaths 'fix' the problem by continued meddling and doubling down? As predicted it's just making things worse. So does your solution really seem rational to you?

The Fed is doing what socialist/fascist countries like Argentina and Venezuela are doing, but on a global scale. It'll produce the same bad results. You're a fake troll like MDB.

well here we are again, bernanke yellen obama bush, what the hells the difference? their handlers prepare them, they say the right things, and the stock market goes up on cue. i am bored with it all. what happens when the former middle class disappears into the heartland of america, bothers them not one little bit, as long as NYC is the hob of the global economy. bush stole the red states from good people and gave it to the war mongers. now the replacements are arriving, seeking the old values, decency honesty peace. from that resentment will grow, and the older warrior class who performed in iraq and afghanistan will join the renassiance in midwestern values, and lay siege to washington. sorry status quo politics, but you never had a chance

You are just confuse; you see she means we are moving away from a system of self reliance where one works to provide for themselves and their family basic needs to one in which we are provided by the government what the government deems necessary for us to have while all the jobs go to other countries and the profits go to the elite.

I think its called post scarcity. It will be kinda like star trek only instead of spaceships the people will live in favelas.

Can these folks do anything other than keep selling the same old lie? I guess it doesn't matter as half the population can't even tell when they're being lied to anymore.

This whole culture is a lost cause. It has multiple possible negative and very nasty outcomes and few positive ones (anymore I'm seeing sporadic electricity as a positive for the denizens of the US as it'll get them doing something other than watching TeeVee.). When the USA bus finally crashes at the bottom of the cliff the likely response from the rest of the world, including all people, plants, animals and inanimate objects will be "good riddance."

I take anything Michael Snyder says with a grain of salt. I have posted before in here in my view, Michael may well be one of the most consistently negative bloggers I have ever seen. While there are elements of validity to what many of his points are, I have learned to tune his largely negative messaging out as I have never seen him post a positive aspect about anything. To me, a blogger gains credibility if his message includes both aspects, not just 100% negative or 100% positive. Yeah, I hear the message, yeah I was affceted by the Great Recession, but move on or add some perspective, Michael. To those who do not share your negative inclinations, you may be more persuasive.

I'll move myself and my family aside If we happen to be left half alive I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky For I know that the hypnotized never lie

Do ya?

There's nothing in the street Looks any different to me And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye And the parting on the left Is now the parting on the right And the beards have all grown longer overnight

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution Take a bow for the new revolution Smile and grin at the change all around me Pick up my guitar and play Just like yesterday Then I'll get on my knees and pray We don't get fooled again Don't get fooled again No, no!

Damn, all these years, I thought he sang "the Hippie Times" rather than the hypnotized. I think in one live gig he actually sang The Sunday Times which may have fooled me. I won't get fooled again. I live and learn.

I am convinced...that Yellen was chosen as head of Fed simply because she had the right look...that troll-ish, stupid, dead-eyed look that will burn into our memories of the worst series of events in our lives.